| Truth Seeker Magazine
Steve Allen: 20th-Century Renaissance Man by Tim C. Leedom
"It is a shame that so many people think of Steve Allen only as a popular entertainer. Steve Allen is a true Renaissance man by every definition of that word. As a writer and lecturer in the history of religions and our human spiritual evolution he is superb. His knowledge in comparative mythologies adds to his academic stature. Reading and listening to Steve Allen is time well spent. His contribution to religious literacy is monumental."-William Edelen As one of the great talents of the 20th Century, Steve Allen can claim a spectacular list of accomplishments. (The list is incomplete because Steve Allen is still producing.) He created and hosted the Tonight show, authored 44 published books, starred on Broadway in The Pink Elephant, and starred in motion pictures, most notably Universal's The Benny Goodman Story. He has written over 4,600 songs, including This Could Be The Start of Something Big and South Rampart Street Parade, as well as the score for several musicals, including the Broadway production of Sophie and the CBS-TV version of Alice in Wonderland. Allen produced some 40 record albums, including Steve Allen Plays Jazz Tonight for the Concord Jazz label, and he wrote the stirring Irish drama, The Wake, which won an L.A. drama critics' nomination as best play of 1977. Allen starred in the critically-acclaimed NBC series The Steve Allen Comedy Hour and created, wrote and hosted the Emmy award-winning PBS-TV series Meeting of Minds. He was inducted into the TV Academy's Hall of Fame and in 1993 became Abbot of the world-famed Friars Club, succeeding Milton Berle. In the Foreword to "Dumbth" and 81 Ways To Make Americans Smarter, published by Prometheus Books, Norman Cousins says: "The world knows Steve Allen as a musician and as an entertainer. In addition, his friends know Steve Allen as someone whose thought processes are always working as a student of history and world affairs, as a philosopher, and, finally, as someone who takes pains to get the most out of his own capabilities. Certainly no one I know has thought more carefully about the use of his time and skills-or his relationships to other people. I first became aware of these special propensities when, in the middle of conversation, he whipped out a mini-tape-recorder and dictated notes to his secretary by way of following up on a point that emerged from our discussion. When I visited his office for the first time, I was enormously impressed with the organization of his files, which I learned he designed himself. I was consumed with envy at his ability to maintain access to, and stay in possession of, his past. I was to discover that he organizes his memories no less systematically than he does his papers." As anyone who has ever attempted to write a book can tell you-much time is spent in preparation, study and research-but 44 books published! It's almost incomprehensible. From "Dumbth" here are just a few of the 81 ways or rules:
Believe it or not, this simple step, by itself, will produce positive results, however modest. It alone obviously cannot achieve the desired effect, but it is a necessary beginning. The conscious act of will it requires narrows our concentration on the particular task. As anyone knows who has ever attempted to learn chess, table tennis, roller skating, to play the piano, or any other activity requiring special concentration and coordination, the simple decision, the will to master the ability, is always a necessary part of the process.
For those who are still in school, this should be easy. Others can visit a used-book store and pick up a couple of good, recent college-level psychology texts. Engineers read about engineering, musicians read about music, athletes about sports, etc.; anyone who decides to become something of a thinker should read about thinking.
Let's begin to apply the word not. It may strike you as odd, even comic, but the truth is that one of the wisest things we can say is, "I do not know." I have not the slightest doubt that the drama of history, and the unknown prehistoric ages, would have been somewhat more peaceful if the honest concession of ignorance had been more common.
When some people hear reason being endorsed they assume that, if the amount of rationality in the world is increased, it must inevitably follow that certain increments of sensation and emotion will decrease. The supposition-or fearful concern-is, of course, groundless. Certain things will indeed be decreased if the domain of reason is enlarged, but they are such things as foolishness, fanaticism, brawling, fear, ignorance, bigotry, and racial, ethnic, and religious prejudice. As for the enjoyments of the senses, as for the warm, beautiful, endearing emotions, two things are possible: Either they will be unaffected by an increase in the reasoning faculty or-as seems more likely-they will be enhanced, since the increased exercise of reason will to a certain extent decrease those negative emotional factors that now limit the sensible joys of life.
Most of us think of education incorrectly. The word itself does not come properly into focus. We know readily enough, in a general sense, what it means, and we grasp the obvious, which is that education is a matter of acquiring knowledge. But when we think of the process, what comes to mind is a series of vague images of school buildings, books, teachers, classrooms, tests, data. All of these have their relevance, but we should pass through them to the heart of the matter. The central item in the process of education is the individual human being. To you, the most important player in the ongoing drama of education is yourself.
Novelist Walker Percy, among millions of others, is concerned about the great amount of time people spend watching television. Its influence? "Nobody has any idea," he has said. "It's the greatest, most revolutionary change in our culture since print. It has even more influence on our lives. People average five to six hours daily watching television. You can't tell me that five or six hours a day of feeding the mind is not having a profound influence." Percy is right.
It is a source of considerable sadness to me that I have spent so little of my time in the company of intellectuals. I hold no contempt for non-intellectuals. One would have to despise the human race if one did. But my soul and mind open up in the presence of highly intelligent people, in conversation with them, to a degree that rarely happens in other theaters of social contact.
Learning to think better also requires that we develop an at least rudimentary familiarity with the laws of physics; which is to say, the laws that govern the actual world. Doing so will make us less likely to be susceptible to superstition, to become the victim of pseudo-science, or to be guilty of common errors about the natural universe. Steve Allen's varied interests range from the migrant farm worker to the 5000-year history of China. His most recent book, Murder on the Atlantic, published by Zebra Press, is the sixth in a series of murder mysteries. He is still an active thinker, and with his multi-talented wife, Jayne Meadows, spends two-thirds of the time traveling. As a contributing author in The Book Your Church Doesn't Want You To Read, published by the Truth Seeker Co., Allen has expanded his observations on abortion, crime, the press, war, virtue, sex, marriage, atheism and more in Reflections, published by Prometheus. In Steve Allen on the Bible, Religion and Morality he focuses his talents and critical intelligence on the Bible. In a work reminiscent of Voltaire's Philosophical Dictionary, Allen presents his ideas as a series of alphabetically arranged essays. Here are a few highlights: A Word to Believers. During many years as a churchgoer I often heard or read Catholic or Protestant commentaries strongly critical of atheists or other persons who, it was said, "hated God." Only later did I come to realize that an atheist does not hate God; he simply is one who is unable to believe that a God exists. However, at that earlier time I embraced the implication that anyone who wrote critically of God would be intellectually depraved indeed. The strange thing is that it is not the atheists (many of them respected scientists, scholars, and philosophers) who have committed this offense. Rather, it is the mostly unknown authors of the Old Testament, who have, unwittingly or not, attributed to God hundreds of crimes as bad as, if not sometimes worse than, some of the enormities committed by humans. A Word to Nonbelievers. Many atheists, agnostics, freethinkers, Secular Humanists, and other critics of organized religion have made the mistake of assuming that since some aspects of Judeo- Christian belief seem preposterous to them, they must also seem so to most defenders. Therefore, it is reasoned that the latter are brazen hypocrites pretending to have faith in a philosophy that they do not in fact respect. That Christianity and Judaism on the one hand and hypocrisy on the other are not mutually exclusive is, alas, all too well established, but I believe that the majority of believers are sincerely convinced of the general reasonableness of their own versions of a faith. Prayer. For me to appreciate is, in the same moment, for me to feel grateful. If I am appreciating a meal prepared for me, there is a sense of gratitude toward the preparer. In that sense, of course, it is not unusual that one reaction leads to the other. We respond by thanking the person who hands us a cold drink on a hot day, something to eat when we are hungry, or who does even less important favors or services. But I feel the same pairing of emotions about the gifts and splendors of nature, even though there is no way to determine whether they are available because of a creator's intent or are simply fortunate accidents. At the moment I record these reflections, for example, my sense of gratitude has welled up because of a combination of physical circumstances: an ideal temperature in the low 80s, a clear sky, warm sun and, most pleasurable of all, a cooling breeze. Given that hosts of individuals on other parts of the planet are at this moment dying of thirst and hunger, it can hardly be intelligently argued that a God has purposely ignored their prayer and entreaties while going out of his way, at the same moment, to provide me with such pleasure. The sense of gratitude, nevertheless, is not only felt but recognized. Conclusion. No doubt some of my Christian friends, and a greater number of others whom I do not know, will wonder why I have written such a book. There are two factors alone which comprise the explanation. The first is the Bible itself. During the years of my fervent belief, I simply had no idea how many sorry and embarrassing passages there are in the scriptural record. I had encountered a few instances of critical literature, but it had largely bounced off the armored shell of my bias and loyalty to the Catholic church. I had unthinkingly accepted the argument that critics were atheistic and evil men who wished only to attack good, decent believers. Now that I'm older, at least somewhat wiser, and certainly better informed, I am deeply ashamed of having held opinions so unconnected to reality. I've known very few atheists but, without exception, they have been men and women of principle, and admirable as citizens. Of the few truly despicable human beings I have encountered, I regret to report that almost every one of them was at least a nominal believer in one religion or another. When we think of Steve Allen we think of past great thinkers such as Thomas Paine, Thomas Jefferson, and Voltaire, who were the people of their time. This is the time of Steve Allen. He is the 20th-Century man leading us into the 21st Century with his clear and witty style, which makes the difficult subject of today accessible to every reader. Tim C. Leedom was educated at the University of Kansas, and completed his studies at the University of Hawaii, being the recipient of several fellowships in journalism and political science. He is the editor of "The Book Your Church Doesn't Want You To Read" and is currently working on a film about religion.
Table of Contents | 1995 Issues | Subscribe Credit card Orders call: 800-321-9054 or fax: (619)676-0433 Truth Seeker is published by Truth Seeker Co., Inc. (ISSN 0041-3712) © 1996 |